1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a device and a method for processing information, a recording medium, a computer program and contents-related data. More particularly, the present invention relates to a device and a method for processing information and a recording medium, and a computer program that are adapted to read or write contents-related information and also to such contents-related data.
This application claims priority of Japanese Patent Application No. 2003-360188, filed on Oct. 21, 2003, the entirety of which is incorporated by reference herein.
2. Related Background Art
It has been made possible to replay various contents of music, movie films, television programs and so on by means of various information processing devices including personal computers, PDAs (personal digital assistants) and portable players.
With such a device, contents may be managed in various different ways. For example, desired contents may be selected and replayed, sorted into groups or moved to some other device, while information relating to contents such as the names of players and the titles of contents may be edited. As contents are managed and manipulated in such ways, the information processing device that handles contents records information relating to the contents including the titles of the contents and the names of players and displays the recorded information on the display unit contained in it or an external display unit connected to it. A user of the information processing device may direct the information processing device to replay or move contents by referring to the information being displayed on the display unit.
The amount of information relating to contents has been increasing gradually in recent years. When a device having a relatively small information processing capacity such as a portable player handles information relating to contents, it can be time-consuming for it to retrieve and read desired information. A similar problem can arise for such a device to write desired information that relates to contents.
Consideration has not been paid satisfactorily to version ups of the data format of information relating to contents. When a version up becomes necessary for the data format, it has been a general practice to redefine the data format and carry out cumbersome processing operations of updating the firmware of the device correspondingly.